Friends Forever
by BlackFox12
Summary: Written for the Pick N Mix challenge over at Spanking World on LiveJournal. Set after the events of the movie. Johnny has some things he wants to say to Carl


**Friends Forever**

**Disclaimer:** I don't own anything from the movie Starship Troopers and I'm not making any money from this fic

**Summary:** Set after the events of the movie. Johnny has some things he wants to say to Carl

**Warning(s):** Spanking; spoilers for the first move in the Starship Troopers franchise; some violence

**Author's Note:** This fic is one I'm writing for the Pick 'n Mix challenge over at Spanking_World on Livejournal. The three prompts for this fic are: invitation, flowers, wish

###

It hadn't been that long since the breakthrough, since they'd managed to capture the bug who could think. That had been the last time Johnny had seen his best friend. Carl. As he lay in his bunk, listening to the sounds of men and women getting ready for bed, he couldn't stop thinking about his once best friend. It was strange, if he was totally honest. After all, with the ongoing war, he'd forced himself not to think about anything personal. Anything from his past. It was all stored away safely inside his mind, along with all the thoughts and memories of his parents.

Even after everyone was settled in their cots and lights were out, Johnny still couldn't sleep. Every time he closed his eyes and tried to sleep, his mind would start playing over with thoughts of his one-time best friend.

He didn't know how long he lay there for, trying to sleep and failing, before he finally gave up. It was long enough that everyone else around him was fast asleep, snoring and grunting. As he headed towards the door of the dormitory, he heard one of the men muttering something in his sleep and glanced back, seeing a damp glisten of tears on the soldier's cheeks.

Tears weren't unusual, but if the man didn't leave his emotions behind, even in sleep, he was going to end up getting himself killed.

Johnny tiptoed out of the dormitory, closing the door behind him with a soft click.

"I see you got my invitation."

"_Fuck_." Johnny's heart raced as his eyes found Carl. "You couldn't send me a vid? Like a normal person?"

"I couldn't take the chance that any message I sent you would be intercepted."

"You think those smart bugs have...what? Got spies here?" Johnny shook his head. "They're _bugs_. Everyone hates them."

"You'd be surprised." Carl stood a short distance from Johnny, his body half-turned as if he didn't actually want to actually look at his former friend. "There are times I wish I could go back to being ignorant."

"About the bugs?"

"No. The bugs are easy to understand." Carl turned fully to face Johnny. "I've made a lot of hard decisions since we left school. I never expected anything like this when I first joined the war effort."

"Do you expect me to feel sorry for you?" Even to his own ears, Johnny just sounded tired. "You're not the one on the front lines, Carl. You can stay safe and let the soldiers here, the men and women under my command, do the dirty work for you."

"Don't pretend to take the high road here, Johnny." Carl took a step closer, holding eye contact with him. "After the bugs attacked Earth, you were all about revenge. You went after them all guns blazing. I just pointed you in the right direction, like a loaded gun."

"What are you doing here?" Johnny narrowed his eyes. "Are you looking for understanding? Forgiveness? What?"

"I don't like what I've become."

The words took Johnny by surprise and he frowned, studying the other man's face. "You didn't seem to regret it when we spoke before."

"I thought it was worth everything, winning this war." Carl took in a deep breath and glanced away briefly, his shoulders hunching. "It was easier, somehow, when I was making decisions about men and women I didn't even know." He hesitated.

"Dizzy died because you sent us to that outpost," Johnny whispered.

"If I'd known it was going to happen..."

"You wouldn't have done anything differently," Johnny finished. "You're not the same person you were. Neither am I." That was something of an understatement, he couldn't help reflecting.

"That doesn't mean I don't feel anything," Carl replied. "It doesn't mean I don't regret the choices I had to make through this war. You're the only friend from school I have left, apart from Carmen. And it's easier to come and visit you."

"Why are you here?" If there was a hint of hostility in his tone, Johnny thought he could be forgiven for that. He'd known that he and the rest of the soldiers were being used on the front lines. That they were weapons just being pointed where the people like Carl wanted them to go.

"I want to apologise."

Johnny laughed. He couldn't help it. "Apologise?" He shook his head. "You didn't seem very sorry when I saw you right after Dizzy died. Right after we got the smart bug."

"It's like I told you-"

"Yeah, I know what you said," Johnny interrupted. "I know nothing's changed for you. You won't stop sending me and my soldiers to our deaths if you think it's right. I don't get why you think coming here will make any difference."

"Do you remember what Carmen said, right before we all separated?" Carl carried on without waiting for a response. "It's always been there, at the back of my mind. That we'd be friends forever, no matter what happened." He drew in a deep breath. "I've spent a lot of time studying the bugs. Even the smart one, the bug who can think, are vastly different to us. They don't think the same way. They don't have the same kind of things on their planet that we do."

Johnny frowned. "Like what?"

"Like flowers." Carl shook his head, a half-hearted smile twisting his lips. "They have plants on their planet, but not for aesthetic reasons. Every living thing on their planet has its own purpose. That includes their own offspring. If one's born that doesn't hold any purpose, they're killed before they can use up any resources." He looked fully at Johnny. "They're not all that different to what we could become in our future."

"You're not serious." Johnny barked out a laugh. "We could _never_ become like them. We don't kill our own young."

"We're not far off becoming the same thing. We humans have perfected designer babies. Maybe we haven't yet gone the route of officially killing unwanted babies when they're born, but it does happen." Carl's voice was low and serious. He was looking at Johnny, but not making eye contact with him. "You want to know why I'm here." He paused, took a deep breath and closed his eyes. Then, as if seeming to come to a decision, he opened his eyes again. He removed his belt and doubled it over, then held the folded leather out.

Johnny stared at the implement and then at Carl's face. "You want me to punish you? For everyone who died? That would be a lot of strokes. You'd be better off taking lashes in public." His back stung at the memory.

"It's not about punishment," Carl answered. "I've had the opportunity to look into humanity's future. And I need to do what I can to stop it. That means I need to follow codes of morals and ethics. And there's no one else to hold me to any kind of standards. No one else I would trust to give me any kind of consequences." He hesitated and a more uncertain note slipped into his voice as he said, "I know you don't want anything from me other than friendship. I can turn to you for help and know that you won't use that against me."

Johnny slowly took the belt from Carl's hand, running his fingers over the supple leather. It was thin and flexible. He raised his eyes to Carl's face and nodded. "Yeah. Okay. Turn round. Brace your hands against the wall."

Carl let his breath out in a slow, long sigh and nodded. "Thank you," he whispered. He turned round and braced his hands on the wall, leaning forward and arching his back until his bottom was sticking out.

Stepping to Carl's side, Johnny rested his hand on the other man's back, holding him steady. He lifted the belt and brought it down with a dull thwap on the seat of the other man's pants.

Carl let out a quiet gasp, his hands curling into fists. He stayed in position as the second and third stripes landed, quiet gasps and stifled whimpers escaping him each time the belt landed against his bottom.

Johnny landed the belt in even stripes down to Carl's thighs and then began to bring the belt down again from the crest of Carl's bottom once more.

When the belt landed against his thighs for the second time, Carl's whole body tensed and his cry was audible enough to reach Johnny's ears. It was loud enough that Johnny had to risk a glance back over his shoulder, in case any of his fellow soldiers had overheard the sounds.

Turning back to Carl, Johnny lifted the belt again and then paused.

Carl's shoulders were shaking. The tears weren't that audible, but they were obvious. Johnny stared down at the belt in his hands, then dropped it and began to swat with his hand, covering Carl's whole bottom, down to his thighs.

Carl's breath hissed out sharply and he began to shift from one foot to the other in response to the swats Johnny was giving out. Finally, he gasped out, "Johnny, that's _enough_."

"That isn't your call to make." Johnny began to focus swats to Carl's sit spots and thighs, following every wriggle and squirm with each sound smack. "You want me to be responsible for you keeping to your moral compass? Then you don't get to tell me when to stop." He began to smack a bit harder and faster, gripping tighter to keep him still.

It took about three circuits of smacks with Johnny's hand before Carl slumped forward and began to sob, no longer trying to get away from the spanking.

As soon as he'd surrendered, Johnny stopped the spanking and rubbed Carl's back, waiting until the tears had died down before he helped the other man to stand. Without any hesitation, he stepped towards his friend and wrapped his arms around him in a tight hug.

Breathing in deeply, Carl wrapped his arms around Johnny and held on just as tight.

The two of them stayed like that for a few minutes before Carl loosened his grip and stepped back, wiping at his eyes. "Thank you."

Johnny held the belt out to his friend and watched as Carl put it back around his waist. "You're going to have to tell me when you do something against your moral compass or when you're about to. I'm not going to be able to read your mind or anything like that."

"I know." Carl wiped his eyes again and gave Johnny a slightly watery smile. "I'll come and find you whenever I need a repeat. Whenever I find myself slipping."

"You don't have to come just for that, you know."

"Yeah. I know." Carl's smile softened. "We'll stay in touch, Johnny." He nodded, gave Johnny's shoulder a comradely squeeze and then turned and walked away.

Johnny watched until his friend was out of sight and then turned and walked back into the dormitory.

He knew he'd sleep better now.

**The End**


End file.
